Embracing Self-Love Beyond Valentine's Day: Daily Rituals and Meditation for Inner Peace

Embark on a heartwarming voyage this February with me, the Gentle Yoga Warrior, as we explore the essential practice of self-love, a treasure that's not just for Valentine's Day but a gift to cherish daily. Tune in to discover how the subtle art of self-love can transform even the simplest acts, like sipping water or choosing nourishing meals, into profound rituals of self-care. We'll talk about striking the perfect harmony between indulgence and ambition, and I'll share personal anecdotes that illuminate the path to integrating self-love into the fabric of our everyday lives. You're invited to join the conversation and unveil your own self-care strategies that weave self-love into your daily routines.

In the spirit of fostering this inner connection, I guide you through a serene meditation designed to anchor you in self-acceptance. Picture yourself on a tranquil journey to a shore where each breath is a step closer to meeting your ultimate guide, the embodiment of self-love. As we float together towards this haven of pink petals and gentle embraces, you'll learn to gently release the burdens that no longer serve you, emerging from the meditation feeling loved and valued. This episode promises not only to be a soothing balm for the soul but also a practical guide for carrying the essence of self-love with you, long after our time together has ended. Share your journey with us and become part of a community that values self-love as a way of life.

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Transcript

Speaker 1: 0:38

So, hello everybody, I'm your host, the Gentle Yoga Warrior, and this is Awakened Conscious Conversations podcast. And today I'm doing this extra special love enhanced episode, for, as I recall this, it is the morning of Valentine's Day. To me, valentine's Day can be a little bit cheesy hear me out, all you love birds out there. It can be a little bit cheesy in the sense that there's these great expectations of grippy bunches of kind of flowers and ways to say love, and I think love should be shared every single day, and why not share your self-love today? So today's episode is all about self-love and tapping into your own inner existence, mix with that flavour of February. So, if you remember and you heard the previous episodes, this season is all about the transition from winter to spring, so each month will have a different flavour. So last month was January. We're going into depth, all about how to start making those first plans and getting all things in place where it's February has a little bit more of a flow as spring starts to show its first signs of emerging from the depth of winter. And what better way to kind of continue with that is to kind of get our flow in action for this February. So February may be cold in some areas of the world, depending on where you're joining us. It may be hot where you are, but either way, february is a time where you start to get things moving. So it's not to go from being slow to fast, it's more like kind of, if you were like a horse, you would just start to come from a walk into a canter and that's what you, what they have. The flavour is for this month. So it's movement, but remembering to have times of kind of peace. So just before we start, as always, let's sit very still together and encourage you, to begin with me, with a moment of stillness, take some calming, deep breaths, trying to initiate the breath from the nostrils and starting below the navel, and exhale, inhale slowly, pause and exhale slowly, and that is your greatest gift to bring you back into the moment throughout the course of today. So remember, we at Awaken Conscious Conversations podcast hope to inspire and lighten and assist you on your journey of self-discovery. If you're like a little bit of help and you're interested in having a shamanic healing session or an energy healing session, why not check out our website, shamanichealingsearth, and if you hit the contact page there, then we can send you details, also details on the website.

Speaker 1: 3:54

So for February, I have this amazing idea of that. Let's dedicate this month not only to starting to get our projects moving a bit more, but also injecting it with loads and loads of self-love. So your task for the next week, if you choose to accept it, is to put sprinklings of self-love into everything that you do, and hence that love will then spill out to others. So an example could be is just say you've woken up and you're rushing around and you'll kind of tell yourself oh no, not again, I'm having another day. Could you instead said instead, look at yourself in the mirror and just say to yourself instead Actually, I may have got a blade, but I'm going to remember to put moments of self-love into my day. So perhaps, before you drink your water in the morning, you're going to say to your water oh, dear water, thank you very much for nourishing me. May this water be infused with self-love as you eat your meals today, could you say to the food by thank you, dear food, this food is going to nourish me with self-love. And then could you go deeper? Where is there, maybe, habits that aren't always of a component which brings self-love into your being? And can you step back and use your discernment to decide if that habit is good for you? Example is it self-love to be watching that Netflix series when you could be reading your self-help book, which is helping you on a certain mission? Equally, if you are at a point where you're absolutely exhausted, is it self-love to really push yourself when you need to sleep and maybe on this occasion you may need to sit and watch yourself watch your Netflix series? So it's all about balance.

Speaker 1: 6:04

The trouble is sometimes we always go for the easier option, but the easier option isn't always the best option for us. Perhaps you've been eating really healthy all week and you're going to a friend's birthday party and maybe it would be self-care just to have a little cake with your friend, like, but then if you have one the next day and the next day and the next day and the next day, then that's the self-care gone out of the window. So I'm kind of trying to stay away from. Self-care means that you have to kind of not have any fun or enjoyment, because life isn't like that and you're going to need to want some self care in a sense of fun and enjoyment, but going for like drinks every single night. I'll call it. Drinks every single night maybe feel like the easiest option, but it's not the best option.

Speaker 1: 6:56

The same way, if you always give yourself a hard time, you're always striving or pushing for things and you just so hard on yourself, maybe you need to put a bit of self-care in there and be nice to yourself. Equally, if you're just lounging around blaming others for your life and not getting on with what is right for you, then that is that is the biggest anti-self-care you could ever do. So there's lots of different ways you can bring that self-care into your day and, as you do listen, I'm here to serve you, so I'd really like to hear from you what is a fantastic way in which you sneak a self-care in to your day. My ultimate thing is to sneak a bit of meditation, and I use the word sneak. It's not like it's hidden, it's more like I kind of bring it into my day. I make sure that's a priority. Some days it may be a lot longer than others, but in some way I acknowledge some sort of grace and thankfulness for the day and to me that is the ultimate in self-care.

Speaker 1: 8:03

So, moving on to the whole theme of this month, where we're kind of getting our goals moving and what we're going to do. So if you haven't listened to it, listen to the previous episodes in this series and you'll see what January the flavor that's all about. But if you made some notes of what you would like to achieve, this is the time to kind of start putting the actions into that. So from so, from your notes I'm going to just pick something randomly here. So maybe your notes were I want to do a bit more exercise and you start doing a little bit more in January.

Speaker 1: 8:37

But how can you expand on that? How can you make it go a bit further? What ways can you make that a thing of enjoyment in your life so you're more likely to stick to it? And then, if one of the things was like spending, how can you save? Bring your savings up a bit more? Maybe you could go for some like high intensity saving and high intensity cutback, because you're all seeing the long-term goals instead of the short-term satisfaction which is what we often go for. So how can you make that even more deeper? What nourishing thing can you add to your week which is going to support, as we were talking earlier self-love, that's going to support your soul and it's going to support your way forward in life.

Speaker 1: 9:28

So perhaps you want to be an entrepreneur, but you want to be an ethical entrepreneur, so is there any ethical entrepreneurship book that you can read? Maybe there's a group. Maybe motivation is something that you lack in. Is there like some sort of online network group you can join, like I'm on some podcast groups, because that really helps me see what, what my friends are doing, and also we learn from each other, and I think it depends from there's enough for everyone. There is enough space for everyone. We just. The more we can be our unique voice, the better it could be for everyone else. And food for thought.

Speaker 1: 10:17

Today is the day of love. As I record this even if you're listening to it in the future and it isn't what are the free, random acts of love that you can bring for yourself today and what free, random acts of love could be sure towards someone else? Sometimes it can be as little as smiling. It's smiling the senior as they get on and off a bus, or helping them on and off a bus, if they want you to help them, of course. Or it can be like doing something kind of just checking on a friend and just saying oh, how are you? You know, like Valentine's Day is not good for everyone. Some people have lost partners, some people are single and I'm not through choice and it could be all different components. And what random acts of kindness can you do for them and what can you do for yourself? Maybe it could be just something as simple as oh, I'm going to come home and I'm going to do half an hour of yoga, then I'm going to relax and listen to my favorite piece of music. That can be all different things, so I hope this special Valentine's Day special was of use to you.

Speaker 1: 11:24

As always, here is a meditation inspired by today's show. As promised, here is your meditation inspired by today's show. Top tips for the meditation is either sit nice and cross-legged on the floor for nice straight back, always nice to sit on the block or a cushion, or that's not available for you you sit in a chair with the back nice and straight. The important thing is you're not slouching and if you're doing something that requires you a concentration, all you need to do is just pause this and you can reconvene the meditation at a time that is good for you. If you're doing the meditation, that's begin.

Speaker 1: 12:08

So as you close your eyes and you breathe in and out through the nostrils, you feel as if you are like a sail floating on a boat. So you're blowing in the wind, you can hear the sound of that sail and just for once you're surrendering to the journey in which this boat is taking you. So, as you breathe in time with the tide, so inhale, exhale out. In time with the tide, inhale, exhale out, and you feel that gentle rhythm. It may be smaller than the rhythm that I'm presenting to you, it may be quicker, but there's a natural rhythm that you find and you're completely safe on this boat in your imagination, as you float, and the sky is this soft, peachy pink colour, and even the ocean has this pink tint to it. It feels kind of as your space of deep loving and acceptance and you allow yourself to float down, float along on the water in that rhythm and softly.

Speaker 1: 13:44

As you move along, your boat comes to a shore.

Speaker 1: 13:57

The shore is sprinkled with pink, delicate petals and as you walk barefooted across these petals, these petals bring you to an opening in a beautiful word, and in the word there is a bandstand, like you get in those old British parks where people use it in the old display band, but instead this bandstand is decorated with flowers, each a reflection of an aspect of the self-love that is contained within the essence of your soul.

Speaker 1: 14:36

And as you approach that bandstand, you see in front of you someone who is there to help and guide you on your journey into self-love.

Speaker 1: 14:56

However, that person presents themselves to you in this safe, loving and kind environment as you gingerly make your way up those steps, that person extends their arms towards you as you, lovely, embrace yourself, which in turn is a reflection of the essence of your soul so comforted and warm do you feel in this embrace, so full of love and so full of grace.

Speaker 1: 15:32

As you inhale, you allow that love to reach to your outer being. As you exhale, you lovingly offer that which no longer serves you back to the universe to be transformed into love, and take another breath. And then you exhale, you, in that aspect of your soul that showed you love, bow lovingly towards each other and you say thank you to your soul, thank you for your guide, thank you to yourself. As you slowly turn your back now and walk slowly back down the peddled path to your boat, you sit there and allow that feeling just to warm every aspect of your being softly, calmly, and as you open your eyes, you find yourself back wherever you are right now, remembering that self love is just a meditation, a moment, a breath away, and that it never leaves you. It's just that sometimes you forget our ability to remember, but may, every time you take a breath, you remember the greatness of who you are.